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Super Rugby: Blues vs. Hurricanes in Auckland (13/04/2013)
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<blockquote data-quote="Darwin" data-source="post: 564211" data-attributes="member: 24910"><p>Yes, that happened with a few players. NZ have a policy of only selecting player to go to one tournament (with a few exceptions), therefore NZ players of Pacific Island origin often play for their Tonga/Fiji/Samoa for one U20 tournament before playing for NZ the next season.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>Quite a lot actually! "great work at the breakdown McCaw" "Great defense McCaw" "Powerful run their by McCaw".... Opensides get mentioned a lot actually - Savea was mentioned almost every minute last weekend. George Smith was mentioned almost every 30 seconds last night! In addition Savea is a different style of 7 to McCaw, and you would probably expect to hear his name mentioned even more than McCaw's.....</p><p></p><p>Anyways, back to the match. The Blues completely outplayed the Hurricanes this match - there defense in particular impressed me (again). Luatua was an obvious standout for the Blues, but he did get very good support in the pack from Luke Braid and Peter Saili, and McCartney. Weepu again impressed at halfback - he is some much better when he isn't carrying a spare 10kgs.... Noakes was ok at 10 (though still can't tackle), while the midfield worked well even without Ranger - Willison looked very dangerous at times. Ranger was pretty well contained but was a menace at the breakdown (as usual), while Halai had a massive game on the right wing. Piutau had a mixed game again - he looked deadly with ball in hand, but made a pile of handling errors.</p><p></p><p>Hard to pick many standouts for the Canes. Ben Franks had a couple of great moments, but in general the tight-five was outplayed. Shields did well at 6 (though was completely overshadowed by Luatua), while Savea and Levave were solid behind a retreating pack. Perenara did some good things again, while I wasn't convinced with Pisi at 10. He made some great individual plays, but the backline functions far better as a unit with Barrett running the show IMO. Bateman was poor (for the second week in a row) - I wonder whether they will give Lee-Lo a run at 12 next week? Smith got few chances at centre, and while both wings tried hard they weren't give much space to work with. Barrett looked pretty composed at fullback, but should hopefully be back at 10 next weekend...</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Darwin, post: 564211, member: 24910"] Yes, that happened with a few players. NZ have a policy of only selecting player to go to one tournament (with a few exceptions), therefore NZ players of Pacific Island origin often play for their Tonga/Fiji/Samoa for one U20 tournament before playing for NZ the next season. Quite a lot actually! "great work at the breakdown McCaw" "Great defense McCaw" "Powerful run their by McCaw".... Opensides get mentioned a lot actually - Savea was mentioned almost every minute last weekend. George Smith was mentioned almost every 30 seconds last night! In addition Savea is a different style of 7 to McCaw, and you would probably expect to hear his name mentioned even more than McCaw's..... Anyways, back to the match. The Blues completely outplayed the Hurricanes this match - there defense in particular impressed me (again). Luatua was an obvious standout for the Blues, but he did get very good support in the pack from Luke Braid and Peter Saili, and McCartney. Weepu again impressed at halfback - he is some much better when he isn't carrying a spare 10kgs.... Noakes was ok at 10 (though still can't tackle), while the midfield worked well even without Ranger - Willison looked very dangerous at times. Ranger was pretty well contained but was a menace at the breakdown (as usual), while Halai had a massive game on the right wing. Piutau had a mixed game again - he looked deadly with ball in hand, but made a pile of handling errors. Hard to pick many standouts for the Canes. Ben Franks had a couple of great moments, but in general the tight-five was outplayed. Shields did well at 6 (though was completely overshadowed by Luatua), while Savea and Levave were solid behind a retreating pack. Perenara did some good things again, while I wasn't convinced with Pisi at 10. He made some great individual plays, but the backline functions far better as a unit with Barrett running the show IMO. Bateman was poor (for the second week in a row) - I wonder whether they will give Lee-Lo a run at 12 next week? Smith got few chances at centre, and while both wings tried hard they weren't give much space to work with. Barrett looked pretty composed at fullback, but should hopefully be back at 10 next weekend... [/QUOTE]
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Super Rugby: Blues vs. Hurricanes in Auckland (13/04/2013)
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